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Introducing a new post catogory for this blog! In Lore Corner I will go trough some backstory behind different things in the Warcraft universe and how they appear in World of Warcraft.

The Lore

Dryads are daughters of the demigod Cenarius, Lord of the Forest and allies of the Night Elves. They watch over the forests and protect them from all harmful forces.

In addition to having rather interesting sense of humor, dryads are playful, curious and peaceful by nature and they despise violence. However, they will use force against anyone who threathens the forests or their allies. In combat dryads use poisoned spears and are particularly strong against enemies wielding magic since dryads are immune to its effects.

Some adventurous dryads leave their forests to explore the world outside or to bring the nature’s wrath to their enemies. It is unusual however and most dryads stay in their home forests. Since the closest race to dryads are the Night Elves they usually speak Darnassian but they also are familiar with Common, Low Common and Taur-ahe. In addition to this dryads can also communicate with animals by using body language and vocalizations.

(Source: WoWWiki)

In Warcraft 3

My personal first encounter with dryads was in Warcraft 3. Swift moving ranged DPS with some special abilities. Not enough damage to valid making more than couple / army but they really had their spot on helping wearing down enemies. Dispelling magic effects and kiting with poison. Being magic immune kinda drives me nuts though.. it’s nice protection against enemies but very frustrating when you can’t cast Rejuvenation on them. However it was not their abilities what made them one of my favorite characters in the Warcraft universe. It was just their personality. So much fun with all the comments they throw at you. Not that there is such thing as morale in Warcraft 3 but I always felt that if there were such thing the dryads would always lift up the atmosphere in my army. Fall like leaves! …in Fall. Now there’s a battlecry for you.

In World of Warcraft

In World of Warcraft you can spot dryads in Darnassus, Teldrassil, Darkshore, Ashenvale, Stonetalon Mountains, Desolace (including Maraudon), Blade’s Edge Mountains, Hyjal Summit, Borean Tundra (Nexus), Dragonblight, Howling Fjord, Crystalsong Forest and Storm Peaks (Ulduar).

Dryads are mostly treat of the Alliance in terms of questing. Exceptions can be found in Desolace, Blade’s Edge Mountains and Howling Fjord. Granted Horde also has quests to kill dryads (Stonetalon Mountains and Ashenvale) but that’s just evil and makes me sad.

Here’s a full list of quests that are given by dryads. Probably a full list.. I am doing this purely from memory so correct me in comments if I miss something. 99.9% confident I remember all of them though.

Also just in case someone is reading this in Cataclysm or later: this post was written in Wrath of the Lich King. The quests might have changed a little since.

~ Teldrassil ~

The Woodland Protector
NPC: Tarindrella
Side: Alliance
Required level: 3

Lowest level quest you can do for dryads. Found in the Night Elf starting area, Shadowglen.

~ Darkshore ~

Therylune’s Escape
NPC: Therylune
Side: Alliance
Required level: 15

A short escort quest you can find in Master’s Glaive.

~ Ashenvale ~

Raene’s Cleansing
NPC: Shael’dryn
Side: Alliance
Required level: 18

Part of a longer questline, 11 in total, this is the first part given by Shael’dryn and it is followed by 4 more. The first part of the questline is given by Raene Wolfrunner in Astranaar and can be obtained at level 18. Trivia: You can hear my blog title druidic in nature while doing this questline.

Vile Satyr! Dryads in Danger!
NPC: Illiyana
Side: Alliance
Required level: 26

First part of a 2 part questline. After that she offers one more quest. You can find her in Forest Song.

The Branch of Cenarius
NPC: Anilia
Side: Alliance
Required level: 26

Anilia puts her hands on your shoulders and draws you close. Gasping, she points towards the arch to the north, before her eyes close and her last wheezing breath leaves her body. “He has taken it… Geltharis…” You know in your heart that Anilia’s dying wish is to see the Branch of Cenarius back in dryad hands.

Awwww that is so sad! Makes me cry. That satyr is so #&%!! dead.

Satyr Slaying!
NPC: Illiyana
Side: Alliance
Required level: 26

Payback time. Droprate is low but that’s fine. I’m happy to slay extra.

~ Desolace ~

Corruption of Earth and Seed
NPC: Selendra
Side: Horde
Required level: 45

Horde version of the Maraudon weapon quest. You can find her just a short walk south from Shadowprey Village.

Legends of Maraudon
NPC: Cavindra
Side: Both
Required level: 41

Found in the orange section of Maraudon, outside the instance.

~ Blade’s Edge Mountains ~

Malaise
NPC: Daranelle
Side: Alliance
Required level: 65

Two part quest. You return to her to hand in the second part. She’s located in Sylvanaar.

Culling the Wild
NPC: Faradrella
Side: Both
Required level: 65

Found in Ruuan Weald.

~ Howling Fjord ~

Spirits of Ice
NPC: Lurielle
Side: Both
Required level: 69

You can find her in the Frozen Glade, south from Fort Wildervar. There is a quest for both Horde and Alliance that sends you to talk with her and you should take it before talking to Lurielle, otherwise you can’t complete it later and miss some experience.

Horde version: The Frozen Glade
Alliance version: The Enigmatic Frost Nymphs. For some reason before you get this quest you must first do I’ll Try Anything!.

Another note about this NPC.. if you’ve just done Friend or Fowl? she will be hostile to you. So remember to logout first.

The Fallen Sisters
NPC: Lurielle
Side: Both
Required level: 69

Wild Vines
NPC: Lurielle
Side: Both
Required level: 69

Spawn of the Twisted Glade
NPC: Lurielle
Side: Both
Required level: 69

Seeds of the Blacksouled Keepers
NPC: Lurielle
Side: Both
Required level: 69

Keeper Witherleaf
NPC: Lurielle
Side: Both
Required level: 69

All in all quite a few quests from her. I love how the dryads at Frozen Glade like to play snowball fight from time to time.

~ Dragonblight ~

Strengthen the Ancients
NPC: Sarendryana
Side: Alliance
Required level: 71

You can find her in Star’s Rest. Before getting this quest you must first complete The Focus on the Beach which is a part of longer questline. First quest for it is A Strange Device.

I think dryads are one of the coolest characters in game. They’re sooo cute and crack those horrible but so funny jokes. All they’d want to do is play and live in peace. They’re kinda like hippies of this game. Well… except that a dryad will thrust a spear through you if you do something to defy mother nature.

One thing bothers me though and it’s the quests. They are so sad. If you read the quest texts they’re all about something horrible that has happened to them. Why Blizzard.. why such harm for these poor creatures. I want some happy quests instead. Like… dance with dryads at a meadow filled with flowers or something. Meh.. and things are only about to get a lot worse in Cataclysm when the land is scarred by fiery chasms.

I hope at some point there will be happier times. Until then.. if you need me I’ll be playing tag with dryads. And be warned… no funny business with the trees. Otherwise we’ll kick your ass.

Personally I like the holiday achievements. It’s nice to do something different, however pointless, every now and then. And with the Strange Trip done I don’t have to stress about not missing any achievement anymore. Hm, actually this is a good time to look back on the past holiday events. What was good and what was bad.

Lunar Festival

This is just about running around the world and talking to NPCs. I think this is one of the best ones because it gives you an excuse to go out there and see the world. Many zones are really beautiful and last time I hoofed around some of them I still had older computer and the graphics were nowhere near as good as they are now. Zones like Ashenvale, Darkshore, Felwood, Azshara, Moonglade, Duskwood and Feralas are my personal favorites.

Love is in the Air

Erk… I just didn’t like this one.. at all. Flirting with city guards all day long.. not really my thing. Also I can’t flirt with just anyone.. have to be pretty ones, which made it all more difficult. Darnassus was easy, Stormwind annoying and Ironforge just impossible. They don’t allow females in Ironforge guard? Oh, and that terrible Flirt With Disaster? Psshh… felt dirty for a week after it.

Noblegarden

Eggs, eggs, eggs, eggs, eggs, more eggs, even more eggs. Those who waited couple days for the rush to pass I’m sure it would have been easier. I did all the necessary achievements during first 1,5 days and it was really frustrating at times. Well there was once achievement in this one I actually liked.. the Desert Rose. Maybe it’s a druid thing but it made me feel good. Kinda like what Rimblad does at Light’s Hope Chapel in Eastern Plaguelands.

Children’s Week

Children’s Week has been one of my favorite holidays just because you get new pets. What really made me fear and stress about Children’s Week though was the PvP related achievement School of Hard Knocks. These holiday events are a PvE thing, right? So why this then. Ok to be honest it wasn’t that bad and I think this achievement was more pain for those who actually want to do PvP than all the achievement junkies who run in to mess their game with achievement that encourages to play the specific battleground wrong way.

Oh well.. whatever. I got new pets and Veteran Nanny so I’m happy.

Midsummer Fire Festival

This is like Lunar Festival except bonfires instead of coins. And I like the same thing about this one too.. you get an excuse for some sightseeing. The seasonal boss, Ahune in Slave Pens is nice addition but since he was still at lvl 70 this time there’s really nothing he contributes. Well, maybe a pet if you’re lucky (I wasn’t).

Brewfest

What really annoyed me in Brewfest is the way you need to grind the price tokens for items. 350 for all the clothing you need for Disturbing the Peace and another 200 for Brew of the Month. Then you need another 100 if you want to buy the Pint-Sized Pink Elekk and who knows how much more if you still want something. Ok, granted you can cheat a bit and sell the Brewfest clothes after doing the achievement and get your tokens back but still. If you make people grind something pointless like that then at least don’t make them so expensive.

On the plus side Coren Direbrew was updated to lvl 80 with all the loot and the trinkets are very welcome to many players. If not for your main but you still can get some easy upgrades for your alts.

Hallow’s End

This one was also very nicely done. The achievments were funny and not too grindy. Except maybe if you weren’t very lucky with the random goodie bag you can get every 1 hour. And of course another sightseeing trip this time for candy buckets. Headless Horseman in Scarlet Monastery is pretty fun, probably the best of all seasonal bosses. I hope they upgrade him to 80 this year so the loot goes up too. As downside there was a PvP achievement but it was very easy so… whatever.

Pilgrim’s Bounty

I’m glad they’re adding new holidays and at a glance the achievements look pretty fun too. Looking forward to it.

Winter Veil

Lots of easy stuff here and you get presents! With a Little Helper from My Friends was annoying but doable in reasonable amount of time. I see they added a new achievement for this year.. BB King. To all you Horde people out there… when you go do this on Varian Wrynn, please aim right at the family jewels. Thank you.

Example talent builds

Raiding build

The thing about balance druid spec is you can’t go too many ways with it. You have to pretty much invest almost all of your points to key talents that you can’t go without. What comes to adjusting in my opinion it’s only about mana efficency talents… how much you need is completely up to your gear and what kind of group you run with. Note that in 10 man raid you will not gain mana back as much as in 25 man because you don’t have the luxury of so many buffs from other classes.

5 man build

Pretty much same as the raiding build, except that scrapping most of the mana talents since the boss encounters on 5 mans are so fast you should not run out of mana. Also included Gale Winds because you’ll be doing a lot of AoE with the numerous trash packs.

Complete breakdown of all key talents

As I said above.. there is not too many ways you can spec and the vital talents are all pretty much self explanatory. But let’s look at all of them anyway.

Balance tree

Starlight Wrath
Half a second off from your key nuking spells. Can’t skip it.

Genesis
This talent is usually skipped since it’s not that dramatic damage increase and there’s better options higher in the tree. But it’s an option if you’re looking for a way to dump talents from mana efficeny into damage.

Moonglow
Very nice constant reduction for majority of your damage spells. If you need to boost your mana efficency this is a good talent to do it.

Nature’s Majesty
Everyone loves crit. Also crit is vital in order to keep your Eclipse rolling and getting mana returns.

Improved Moonfire
Often skipped because it doesn’t scale that well and with Moonfire glyph the crit part becomes irrelevant. However if you get 2 piece Tier 9 set bonus you might want to invest on this.

Brambles
This is a PvP talent. You might be using treants yes but with the long cooldown and general unreliability of them you don’t want to spend points on this.

Nature’s Grace
Very nice talent. Everything what makes you cast faster is always welcome. And if you’re at Lunar Eclipse you will often have this one up for whole duration.

Nature’s Splendor
Makes it easier to keep your DoTs up and running and gives you more time to cast other spells.

Nature’s Reach
Getting faster into or staying longer in DPS range is a solid DPS increase. The less you need to move around the better. Also some boss encounters have incoming damage that can be avoided by staying in ‘max range’ – the safer the better.

Vengeance
Yes we do love our crit – on everything. Especially Starfire scales very well with crit.

Celestial Focus
Pushback reduction is nice but the reason for taking this is the haste. 3% is huge increase and you can’t say no to that.

Lunar Guidance
More spellpower is… more spellpower. Pew pew.

Insect Swarm
Vital part for your DPS. The 3% hit decrease for enemies is not important so don’t be afraid of glyphing it.

Improved Insect Swarm
Good damage increase for your main nuking spells. Also plays a role in how you re-apply DoTs for Eclipse.

Dreamstate
Not so good talent. If you need mana boost you’re better off using points in Moonglow and/or Intensity.

Moonfury
Yet another damage increase.

Balance of Power
Huge hit boost, the less hit you need to get from gear the better. Incoming damage reduction is good too but you’re taking this for the hit.

Moonkin Form
The iconic ability what makes you a balance druid. Good for you, good for the group. Also adds yet another /dance to your arsenal. Yay!

Improved Moonkin Form
What really tops this one is that it’s not only you who benefits from the haste increase but everyone in your group too. The spirit thing is good but it’s also kinda bleh. You still don’t want to get any more spirit than you’re forced to. This just makes you feel a little less bad about it.

Improved Faerie Fire
Just like with Balance of Power, the less hit you need from gear the better. Except this time it adds up for your friends too. Oh look.. also more crit.

Owlkin Frenzy
Mainly a PvP talent but it would serve a purpose in PvE too. Some boss encounters have random damage coming at you almost non-stop and I’d imagine this talent would proc a lot. However the thing is you do not have that many points to spend and you rather want to spend them on something what benefits you on all encounters. I always feel kinda sad about this talent.. I’d want it but I can’t quite justify getting it. Maybe when Cataclysm comes and we get more talent points without adding any new talents. Time will tell.

Wrath of Cenarius
Increases the value how your Starfire and Wrath scale with spellpower. Good stuff.

Eclipse
The talent what defines how your casting rotation rolls. It takes some time to get the hang of it and the fact that you can’t control the procs is kinda annoying but all in all it’s a good talent. There might have been a time when you did ok without it but that’s in the past.

Typhoon
A PvP talent obviously. If you really want to use it in PvE then at least glyph it. But even if so it would only be for non-raiding content. In raiding environment it does not do anything that would justify using global cooldown for it rather than some other damage spell.

Force of Nature
Aah the treants. They do ok damage, have rather long cooldown, die easily and tend to shoot off wherever they please rather than the target you were trying to send them into. Also they got shorter duration than Mage water elemental, Shaman spirit wolves and Death Knight ghoul. That is kinda odd.. all of them get same 3min cooldown but the other classes get special abilities and keep the pets for longer. Druid discrimination I say. Regardless.. treants are ok DPS spell even with all the downsides.

Gale Winds
Good AoE damage increase but if you’re a raider this talent does not have a place in the current content. But if you’re doing only 5 mans it’s a good pick.

Earth and Moon
Super sweet damage increase for you and your group. Other classes can provide similar debuff too but since it also increases your spell damage you don’t want to miss it.

Starfall
Good AoE damage with short cooldown. Just one thing.. when did you last time really had to do AoE during boss encounter? Err… Kael’thas in Tempest Keep? It’s kinda shame to have so situational spell as top tier talent but oh well. Personally I just pop it whenever I don’t have anything else to cast. Typically while I am on the move, can’t stop to cast Wrath/Starfire and no DoTs are in need of attention.

Feral tree

No.

Restoration tree

Improved Mark of the Wild
Improving a good buff to even better. The 2% personal stat increase is nifty too.

Nature’s Focus
Pushback reduction is for PvP, skip it.

Furor
Hm let’s see.. intellect = more mana, more crit, more spellpower (via Lunar Guidance). Sounds like win to me.

Natural Shapeshifter
Only reason you want to max this talent is because it’s a prequisite for another. You don’t shift back and forth enough to really have the mana cost reduction to make a difference.

Intensity
Very nice mana talent and good place to dump spare points.

Omen of Clarity
Another good mana talent. Well worth the 1 point even if you’re skipping most of the mana efficency talents.

Master Shapeshifter
Solid damage increase and the main reason you’re going this high into resto tree. Don’t go any further than this tier though.

This week the Blog Azeroth shared topic was suggested by Gryphonheart and the title goes as follows: “10 changes that will make ___ more heroic.” I chose to write about Scarlet Monastery and seeing how big place it is I might be bending the ‘10 changes’ rule a little… Let’s take a look.

The Library

Houndmaster Loksey

Right after engaging Loksey he will randomly mark one player and send his Scarlet Tracking Hounds attack him for 10 seconds, they will focus on the marked player and cannot be taunted or aggroed in any way until the mark has weared off. Dogs will also stack a debuff that reduces healing done to the afflicted player: 10% reduction / stack, max 5 stacks. The debuffs will last until Loksey is defeated. 15 seconds after the mark has weared off he will cast a new one.

You can kill the Scarlet Tracking Hounds first before going for the boss and reduce the difficulty significantly but there is an achievement for not doing so. When Loksey reaches 30% health the dogs will enrage and focus on person at top of Loksey’s aggro list for rest of the encounter. Loksey will no longer mark players after this point.

Arcanist Doan

Few seconds after being attacked Doan will cast a magical barrier on the entrance, limiting players movement to the room he’s in. No tank is required for this encounter since Doan chooses targets randomly rather than based on aggro.

Basic abilities:

Arcane Missiles: 5 second channeled cast on random player, cannot be interrupted.
Arcane Explosion: 2 second cast AoE that does damage to players within 8yd around of him, can be interrupted
Slow: every 10 seconds he will cast a slowing effect on random player, reducing their movement speed by 60% for 10 seconds, can be dispelled.
Flame Strike: cast every 10 seconds under two different players and dealing heavy fire damage to anyone standing on it within 8yd radius, lasts 8 seconds.
Polymorph: random target with no specific timer although it has 15 second internal cooldown.

Special abilities:

AoE Polymorph: at 50% health Arcanist Doan will cast AoE Polymorph (cannot be dispelled, trinketed, bubbled etc.) and unlike normal Polymorph, you will not rapidly gain health
Arcane Detonation: right after the AoE Polymorph Doan starts casting Arcane Detonation which will remove the polymorphs on players and reduce their total health to 50% from what their current health was while polymorphed. Example: if you were at 20k health when AoE Polymorph was casted your max health for the remaining fight will be 10k.
Flaming Floor: after 50% health Arcanist Doan will gain a special ability called Flaming Floor, turning the floor of the room into fiery inferno. It has a 5 second warmup cast and after that Doan will keep channeling it for another 10 seconds until the floor turns into normal again. To avoid being hit by this players need to quickly run on top of the various chairs and tables in the room. Doan will not cast any other spells while channeling this spell and it has a 30 second cooldown.

Key features to surviving this encounter is moving quickly out of the various AoE spells and healing. Especially prior reaching 50% everyones health should be topped up.

Quotes:
Flaming Floor: Let’s turn up the heat.
Killing a player: Quiet! This is a library.

The Cathedral

Scarlet Commander Mograine and High Inquisitor Whitemane

Just like in the classic version this is a scripted two-part boss encounter and first you will be fighting Mograine.

Mograine’s key abilities:

Crusader Strike: physical damage with additional 10% holy damage, stacks a debuff that increases holy damage taken by 10%, max 5 stacks.
Consecration: Consecrates the land beneath Mograine doing holy damage over 8 sec to players who enter the area.
Hammer of Justice: 5 second stun on random player, can be dispelled.
Divine Shield: at 70, 40 and 10% health Mograine shields himself and becomes immune to all damage for 10 seconds. However just like all pro retri paladins he does not heal himself. Can be dispelled.
Overconfident: just after using Divine Shield Mograine believes he has the upper hand and gains 30% attack speed increase for 10 seconds or until Divine Shield is dispelled.

When Mograine is defeated High Inquisitor Whitemane joins the fight.

Quotes:
After casting Divine Shield: Hahaa! I have the power!

Smite: 2 second cast holy damage spell
Holy Fire: 2.5 second cast holy damage spell, does additional 50% holy damage over time, can be dispelled.
Greater Heal: 2.5 second cast single target heal, can be interrupted
Psychic Scream: causes all players within 10yd to flee for 8 seconds, 30sec cooldown, can be dispelled.

At 50% health Whitemane will cast Deep Sleep on all players making them unable to interact for 15 seconds. After this she casts Scarlet Resurrection (10 second cast) on Mograine and heals him back to full health. Mograine casts Lay on Hands on Whitemane and players will have to engage both bosses at full health again.

Easiest way to do this encounter once both bosses are up is to kill Whitemane first since she keeps casting her Greater Heal and if you kill Mograine before her she will just start casting Scarlet Resurrection again which cannot be interrupted. She however does not cast Deep Sleep again.

High Inquisitor Fairbanks

Unlike in the classic version you can’t just sneak up on Fairbanks to kill him. In order to fight this boss you have to do Mograine and Whitemane encounter the hard way. You will have to DPS them both down equally and keep Whitemane’s heals interrupted. Once they’re both pretty much dead you finish off Mograine and right after Whitemane starts to cast Scarlet Resurrection. You got 10 seconds to kill Whitemane before her spell lands. Should you succeed, Whitemane will scream like a frustrated banshee and awaken Fairbanks in his tomb. Fairbanks will walk out into the inner chapel and you will be able to engage him.

Fairbanks’ key abilities:

Mind Flay: shadow damage over 3 seconds, slows target movement speed by 50%, channeled, cannot be interrupted.
Shadow Word: Pain: does shadow damage over 18 seconds, can be dispelled.
Psychic Scream: causes all players within 10yd to flee for 8 seconds, 30sec cooldown, can be dispelled.
Mind Control: mind controls all players for 15 seconds and makes them randomly attack each other, after MC is over he will not cast a new one for at least 30 seconds. During Mind Control Fairbanks does not attack players, he justs sits back and laughs at you.

Quotes:
After hearing Whitemane’s scream: Knock it off you two! What is all this ruckus… you awaken the dead!
Mind Control: *manic cackle* Time for fun!
Wipe: I can’t believe I got up for this…

The Armory

Herod

The Armory is only one boss and stupid amount of trash before him. So in order to make clearing up to him more rewarding he now has a chest next to him with additional loot and emblems. However if you want the additional loot you must reach and aggro Herod within 15 minutes after entering the courtyard area at the start of the instance.

After enganging Herod the doors leading to the room will close.

Herod’s basic abilities:

Mortal Strike: does additional melee damage and reduces healing done on target by 50% for 10 seconds.
Blades of Light: Bladestorm like ability that makes him move slowly but dealing tons of damage to anyone in melee range, lasts 10 seconds, 30 second cooldown.

Roughly every 40 seconds Herod chains 3 different abilities twice, he is untankable during this phase and will reset aggro after it.

Charge: randomly pics a player and charges him, does moderate damage.
Intimidating Shout: causes all players within 10yd to flee for 8 seconds, always used after Charge.
Leap: jumps at random player, does moderate damage and stuns him for 1 second, always used after Intimidating Shout.

Charge -> Intimidating Shout -> Leap -> Charge -> Intimidating Shout -> Leap

After this he will go back to his normal abilities. Keeping the players bunched up will limit his movement but it is also very risky if he uses Blades of Light right after the kombo.

All in all this was quite fun post to write. Definitely could do it again for some other instance.

Here we go again. Last Sunday Twilight Hope took down Anub’arak and that concludes the normal ToC 25 for us. It was a little confusing with tactics at first but once we figured out proper way of dividing DPS between Anub’arak himself and the adds it went down rather smoothly. What comes to the encounter itself I really enjoyed it. It’s not complex at all once you figure out what you’re suppose to do but the fun factor is there.

Was anyone else annoyed how they treated Anub’arak in the early Wrath appearance? Being the end boss off a 5man was such a waste for a badass character like him. Personally I was really upset about that. He deserved more and thank you Blizzard for giving him that.

Last time I posted about wrapping up a raid instance I wrote a short guide-ish-thingy for Yogg-Saron. So let’s do that for this too. And again: this isn’t covering everything you must or must not do, just the things what only balance druid does the way they do.

Phase 1: Anub’arak and the Nerubian Burrowers

Before the Burrowers spawn there’s nothing special to do but when they do there’s two ways you can go: kill them or ignore them. First we tried ignoring them until phase 2 but that didn’t really work out – the debuff stacked way too high on tanks. So instead we went halfway there; kill the first two that spawn, go back to the boss and leave the other two spawning later for phase 2.

One thing I tried here was saving treants until Burrowers come and help down the first two faster but of course it didn’t work. Even if you damage the add and click the treants right on top of it they’ll just dash right off to Anub’arak. Sigh.. so just use them on Anub right at the start.

Phase 2: All adds must die

Once Anub’arak submerges it’s time to really start with killing adds. The small scarabs do not start spawning right away so you got time to help melee with the remaining two Burrowers. However when the scarabs do start spawning switch to them immediately. Look for one that has the most range between you and it so you get as much DPS time as possible on it before it reaches you. If it seems it’s not going to die before reaching you kite it into frost. After the first add I tried to pick ones that had got to melee range of some unlucky player and tried to kill them asap before the debuff gets a chance to stack very high.

After this it’s phase 1 again – finish off whatever adds are left from phase 2 before going back to phase 1 strategy. First and second phase will rotate until you get Anub’arak to 30%.

Phase 3: The final push

Time to finish the boss. Only thing you have to do is give it your damnest DPS.

And the loot goes to…

Chestguard of Flowing Elements – grats Kharn!
Maiden’s Favor – grats Borham!
Signet of the Traitor King – grats Andor!
Trophy of the Crusade – grats Brkomir!
Pattern: Bracers of Swift Death – grats Wacka!
Leggings of the Deepening Void – grats guild bank!
Crusader Orb – another for the bank!

Last updated: patch 3.2

Index

1. Hit, haste and crit

Hit

The most important thing for you is being hit capped. Hit will always increase your DPS more than any other stat until you reach the cap. With full points on talents Balance of Power and Improved Fearie Fire you need 263 hit rating to never miss against a boss at lvl 80. If you have a draenei in your group the cap is at 236. Try to aim as close as possible with this – every single point past the cap does not help you in any way.

Haste

Since the patch 3.2 and Eclipse changes there now is a soft haste cap.

After 400 the haste rating stops affecting your Wrath casts and stacking more haste than that means only half of your Eclipse rotation will benefit from it. Try to aim as close to the 400 if you can but don’t worry if you go over it (as long as it’s not by a huge amount). Haste will still increase your DPS but being past the soft cap means something else would increase your DPS more at this point.

And this something is of course…

Crit

After you’ve reached both hit and haste caps you can start prefering items with crit. If they are capped crit will increase your DPS more.

2. Talents and glyphs

Example raiding build with all the important talents.

There is few talents you may move around if you feel necessary: Moonglow, Intensity, Force of Nature and Starfall. However popular the Force of Nature and Starfall are in common raiding builds they are very situational and do not contribute anything significant you could not do without. But then again there isn’t much else to spend your points on. Personally I would keep them but hey.. up to you.

Must have glyphs:

Glyph of Moonfire, Glyph of Insect Swarm, Glyph of Starfire

These are really your only solid options. As for minor glyphs there’s nothing you absolutely must have. Although Glyph of Unburdened Rebirth is very handy for a raider.

3. Casting rotation

1) Fearie Fire
2) Moonfire, Insect Swarm (and Force of Nature if you have it)
3) Cast Wrath until Lunar Eclipse procs
4) Cast Starfire until Solar Eclipse procs

Re-applying DoTs:
1) Whenever they fall off and no Eclipse is active
2) If you are on the first 5 seconds of Lunar Eclipse, re-apply Moonfire
3) If you are on the first 5 seconds of Solar Eclipse, re-apply Insect Swarm
4) Refresh both DoTs after Eclipse ends if needed

One thing nobody in Moonkin raiding community seems to agree on is when it’s best time to re-apply DoTs during Eclipse – or not to apply at all. Thankfully after the 3.2 changes you do not lose so much DPS even if you’d apply them at the ‘wrong time’. System I use is based on having the max benefit from Improved Insect Swarm for your current active Eclipse.

4. Cooldowns

When to use…

Force of Nature
a) Right at the start of the fight. I would advice to first apply your DoTs before you cast it though – treants tend to run off to wherever they please if you haven’t damaged the target you are trying to send them in to.
b) If encounter has a phase when max DPS is needed save your treants for that.
c) If encounter has lots of AoE damage try to pick a moment when treants are least likely to be hit by it and stay up longest.

Starfall
a) Since it’s an AoE boost you naturally want to use it with Hurricane if possible.
b) If you are moving and hence can only cast instant spells you might aswell use it for little extra damage when you can’t cast anything else anyway. DoTs have priority over this.

Since you can’t control what your Starfall hits be extremely careful or do not use it at all when crowd controlled targets are around. Also if encounter has mobs spawning during it you might aggro them as they spawn before tanks can pick them up.

Barkskin
a) Whenever you are taking large amounts of damage.
b) You are channeling Hurricane or Tranquility and are bound to get few hits.

Rebirth
a) When your raid leader tells you to

Be careful when picking a spot where to res, close to angry mobs isn’t the safest. Also try to pick a moment when the encounter does not or should not have any incoming damage what might kill the ressed person instantly.

Innervate
a) Because the cooldown is only 3min it is good to use it early whenever you gain the max benefit from it.
b) However if you do not need it yourself don’t let it go to waste. Know your group.. there’s always someone who might need it.

5. Useful addons

Omen 3
The ultimate threat meter.

Deadly Bossmods / BigWigs
Provides all the necessary timers, warnings and other things you need to get trough an encounter. Both do fine in my opinion but Deadly Bossmods is probably the more popular one.

Decursive
Helps with removing debuffs from your group. Granted this is more of a healers job but there are times when you need to do it too. Like the Faction Champions in Trial of the Crusader.

Recount
For tracking damage done, damage taken, healing, deaths, DoT uptime, dispels, interrupts, facepalms etc. Ok maybe not facepalms. Very useful addon to keep eye on how your performance shows on charts and maybe even spotting where you need to improve.

Quartz
Casting bar addon. Also keeps track of your DoTs, your current target and separately for your focus target. You can, and should, download Eclipse Module for it to keep track of it too.

This by far my favorite addon. Not only because it tracks my DoTs and I know when to prepare for re-applying them but it also has a sort of enhanced casting bar.

Picture above (can click to enlarge) shows the Quartz in action. DoT timers, casting bar and Eclipse timer. You can move the bars anywhere and change the size of course. The thing with WoWs own casting bar is it’s misleading you a bit. You can start casting new spell before the bar actually reaches the end. Notice the little dark area on right corner of the Quartz cast bar? When the cast reaches that area you can cast new spell. How big the area is depends on your latency. So it helps you to cope with lag a bit too. In any case.. with addon like this you will get tons of more casts out than what you would without. DPS increase without DKP cost.

If you find the Quartz a little bit intimidating with all the numerous customization options and cryptic menus you can give Squawk and Awe a try. It does the same thing pretty much but with less custom options. But if you want to be competetive raid DPS you will need one of these addons. Without a doubt.

Grid
Raid frames addon. There are tons of those but this is the most compact I’ve found. All the information you need without taking too much space on your screen. Perfect.

Scrolling Combat Text
Great for heads up on different things. A lot more custom options than the WoW inbuilt one has.

6. Tips

Macros: combat res

#showtooltip Rebirth(Rank 6)
/c druidchannel << Rebirth away on %t >>
/c healerchannel << Rebirth away on %t >>
/cast Rebirth(Rank 6)

For awareness. Your fellow druids know who you are about to res and healers know who is about to come up with low health and need healing. It can be a good idea to use similar text macro for Innervate to avoid doubles on same target.

Other than that I don’t use any druid specific macros. Moonkin is not a complex class at all and I don’t think there’s really heavy macroing needed.

Consumables

Flask of the Frost Wyrm and spellpower food all the way. Other options aren’t even nearly as good.

Enchant: Tuskarr’s Vitality

Unless if you need hit rating this enchant is the way to go. The faster you move the quicker you both get out of harm and get into DPS position. So in a way it increased your damage. If you get in range faster you’ll do damage sooner. And if you die… well… that’s the biggest DPS loss of them all.

Idol and 2 piece Tier 8 bonus

This is probably 3rd time I post about this but Idol of Lunar Fury is the ultimate idol you can have at the moment. The first thing you buy with Emblem of Triumph should be this. It is absolutely amazing.

Two pieces of Tier 8: Increases the bonus granted by Eclipse for Starfire and Wrath by 15%. This is very good now when you are able to use both Lunar and Solar Eclipse. Well worth keeping two pieces of Tier 8 even if you got access to Tier 9.

And that concludes the 3rd version of my Moonkin raiding guide. Two previous ones have actually only been on my guild forum but anyway. If you got any questions, comments, whatever… feel free to drop me a note. Happy raiding.

Battle-what-net?

For the off chance someone might not know what Battle.net is here’s a little something for you.

In 1997 Blizzard released their first Diablo game and along with that an online gaming service called Battle.net was launched. It was the first online gaming service incorporated directly into the games and with it players could easily create accounts and find other players online to game with. And most important thing of all: it was free. Later other Blizzard games; Starcraft, Warcraft 2, Diablo 2 and Warcraft 3 also made use of this service.

So, what’s ‘new’ Battle.net?

Instead of a game specific account you will have player account which contains all the Blizzard games you play. In addition to being a LFG tool for different games it will most of all be a social networking service – avatars, friend lists, achievements, player rankings, voice chat… You will also be able to record and share your Starcraft 2 matches.

But the most exciting feature by far is the…

Real ID

Simply put you will have a friends list where you add the person, not the characters. Let’s use WoW as an example: instead of adding all the 10 characters your friend has on the server you will only add one which will always display which character, server or even game he/she is on and you will be able to chat with him/her. That’s right, cross-server, cross-faction and even cross-game communication.

Using this feature will be optional and only people who you’ve allowed to see your Real ID can do so. No gold spamming from WoW while playing Starcraft 2 or anything.

Here’s a link to a picture at MMO-Champion which shows how your WoW friends list will look after the change.

Merging your WoW account with Battle.net will be mandatory

It is not that yet but I’m sure by the time Starcraft 2 hits the stores it will be. If you just play World of Warcraft your gameplay experience does not change in any way. Except that thanks to the Real ID feature you can chat with friends on other servers and friends who are playing other Blizzard games. And hey, your friends list will be a lot shorter. I believe there is a limit on how many characters you can add to it? Well, this helps on that matter.

Aah the excitement!

For me the Real ID is just an amazing feature. I got friends who play on different servers and factions and as for myself I play on 3 servers. Not to mention when Starcraft 2 comes I will be playing that. Diablo 3 too without a doubt. Gaming relationships are about to become a whole lot easier. Can’t wait.